The Youth in Germany study shows that 31% of 14 to 29-year-olds believe in a personal God, compared to 25% of 30 to 49-year-olds and 24% of 50 to 69-year-olds.

The recently published survey has been conducted regularly since 2020. Around 6000 people, evenly divided into those 3 age groups, were interviewed.

According to the study, 55% of young respondents professed a religion, among them, most identified with the Christian faith (41%), and 10% said they are Muslims, while 45% do not belong to any religion.

Furthermore, almost 35% of 14 to 29-year-olds agreed with the statement “my faith gives me support in difficult times”. That was also agreed by 26 and 25% of 30 to 49 and 50 to 69-year-olds respectively.

Family, more important than faith

However, the strongest source of meaning in the lives of the younger generation is the family (60%), followed by partnership/love relationships (35%), goals in life (30%) and friendships (30%). Faith is in eleventh place with 12%.

The authors of the study state that those figures show “trends in the declining importance of religion and faith in today's population”. At least 60 % of young people denied belief in a personal God, compared to 51 % in 2022. Among the Muslims surveyed, the faith is still much more prevalent.

When it comes to values and virtues, the study found that young people tend to adhere to more traditional ones.

For 14 to 29-year-olds, family is also the most important value, followed by health and safety, honesty, reliability, helpfulness and politeness.

At the lower end of the values ranking are performance/career, faith/religion and environmental sustainability.

Media use

Youth in Germany also analyses how younger generations use the media, and its consequences.

According to the study, the most important information channels for 14 to 29-year-olds are social media (55%). News websites and news portals are used by 35%.

They also use Google and other search engines as well as television programmes (30% each), while the over-50s prefer traditional media such as television, news websites and printed newspapers, to obtain information.

Furtheremore, young people use their smartphones for almost everything, specially (92%), followed by Instagram and YouTube. Half of the younger respondents uses TikTok regularly.

Mental health on rise among young people

The study also shows that psychological stress is more prevalent in the younger than in the middle and older generations.

According to their own answers, they are “plagued by stress and self-doubt, as well as exhaustion, lack of motivation, discomfort around other people and loneliness”.

Although in all age groups, almost 15% are undergoing psychiatric treatment,, the proportion of 14 to 29-year-olds who feel they need mental health treatment is considerably higher than in the older generations, says the study.

“Today, childhood and adolescence seem to be more stressful than in the past and the biggest difference between younger and older people is that young people experience a smartphone-influenced childhood and adolescence instead of one based on playing together, as was the case in the past,’ say the researchers”, conclude the researchers.